3 year GCSE courses

[mintyneb]

We've just been told today that DD (yr8) will have to chose her GCSEs next summer to start them in yr9.

Up until now the school has done GCSEs over 2 years so traditionally DD would have had over a year before having to make a choice. This has therefore come as something of a surprise.

Apparently research shows that 3 year courses are better all round but as there won't be an info evening until Feb it will be a while before I can officially find out more from school.

Any thoughts from folks whose DC have gone through this and come out the other side?!

If your DD is considering medicine Sheffield medical school specifically states that "the relevant GCSEs should have been studied for no longer than two years;" and I suspect that others will follow.

Are they checking the curriculum of the relevant school for every applicant? If it’s referring to schools doing a 3 year ks4 I don’t see how else they would know.

I'm a school Governor. I'm very glad our school don't do it. I agree with pp's that say it's not favoured in the New Ofsted framework. Broad curriculum and developing the whole child is what I'm getting (our school is due for Ofsted around February so we've had lots of training sessions on this). Ofsted are very keen to spot 'gaming' where certain GCSE's are not offered to certain students or options are arranged in a way to restrict choices in order to gain on Progress 8 (I'm not saying your school are doing this).

Our school do 2 year GCSE and have good attainment. I'm very glad of it as my dd has the most appalling Y9 - heath-wise, mentally, academically. She's taken to Y10 with a new lease of life and feels energised. She's excelling in subjects she would probably have dropped at the end of Y8. It seems to be suiting her. I'm also glad she had that extra time to choice her options.

Our school need to improve their Progress 8 but that's another story.

I know schools that do 3 years, taking a couple of GCSE's early (English Lit etc). Historically they were schools with low attainment. They are improving slowly but I believe this from a vast array of measures and not just down to the 3 year GCSE.

Why don't Ofsted like it?
It works well in my DC's school - they get to drop a couple of subjects they have zero interest in a year early and spend the time doing subjects they do like in more depth. Mine are Y11 and Y9 and there was no stress involved in choosing subjects in Y8. I guess doing more than the standard 9 or 10 GCSEs helps in that respect, they are not closing as many doors as people who do fewer subjects in 2 years.

community.tes.com/threads/ofsted-to-penalise-schools-for-3-year-gcse-courses.785323/

www.google.com/amp/s/schoolsweek.co.uk/ofsted-criticises-3-year-gcses-and-low-ebacc-entry-in-new-inspection-report/amp/

Interesting @Teachermaths - looks like there are a few opinions out there amongst teachers. From the article it seems that ofsted are concerned about schools narrowing the curriculum. So if you can offer "a broad range of subjects" in Y9, you can also start teaching gcse in Y9 (definition of broad is key then - presumably there is a number of subjects that they want to be taught in Y9 but it might be ok if it's fewer than in Y7?).
I am not a teacher so probably missing lots of nuance here. Also not in England so no Ofsted, but DC's school might be ok under these rules as they do 3 yr GCSEs but in more than 9 or 10 subjects.

An Ofsted spokesperson said: "Ofsted does not intend to dictate the length of key stages in schools. Inspectors will be particularly alert, however, to signs of narrowing in the key stage 3 curriculums. If a school has shortened key stage 3, inspectors will look to see that the school has made provision to ensure that pupils still have the opportunity to study a broad range of subjects in Years 7 to 9.
School leaders and teachers should not make decisions about the curriculum based on a sense of what Ofsted wants to see. Rather, our new inspection framework will reward those schools that provide a broad and rich curriculum for their pupils at all of the key stages of primary and secondary school.

Ofsted said our ds' school had a broad and balanced curriculum - and it does 3-year GCSEs. So stuff that in your pipes and smoke it, naysayers! As I say, it is not what you do, it's the way that you do it. Ofsted has not said all schools doing 3-year GCSEs are doing it wrong. It all depends on the school and whether or not it can convince Ofsted it is catering well for its community, rather than just attempting to game the statistics. Schools which second guess Ofsted and make changes they think will please Ofsted regardless of the actual opinions of the people running the place, the students and the parents, are not superior to schools which take a more considered approach.

@walkaround have they said that since September 2019?

No, but very recently - recently enough that the new framework was already known and inspectors clearly had an eye towards it, given the specific references to the strength of the curriculum, cross curricular work, preparing pupils for the future, in the written report.

Is what Ofsted are looking for just about the number of subjects? What might be being cut out or covered in less depth in the ks3 curriculum to condense it into 2 years is probably worth looking at.

Yes it seems like it's not as simple as everyone must do 2 yr GCSEs.

Ofsted does not intend to dictate the length of key stages in schools. If a school has shortened key stage 3, inspectors will look to see that the school has made provision to ensure that pupils still have the opportunity to study a broad range of subjects in Years 7 to 9.
School leaders and teachers should not make decisions about the curriculum based on a sense of what Ofsted wants to see.

It's the early narrowing of the curriculum they are looking at. Some schools have strict rules and a tiny range of options which narrows down pupils exposure to different subjects at age 13/14. Other schools let students do 10 options which doesn't narrow pupils so much and so early.

Research shows nothing of the sort. Stuff and nonsense.

Our school just got an RI because we do three years gcse and another school nearby scraped a good only because they promised to change back to a two year gcse. The argument being there is no way near enough time to cover all of the national curriculum for ks3 in 2 years so students don’t get a broad offer.

Choosing options starting in year 9 worked really well for my DS as he didn't like a lot of the subjects he was studying. So it meant he could chose the ones he liked earlier.
They started off learning general things about the subjects first, rather than jumping straight into the gcse content.
A parent from a different school commented that it seemed like. cheating!

I’m not sure that not liking a subject is a good reason for being allowed to drop it at 13 after only two years in secondary.

My school do a half way house. Options are not choose until the end of year 9, so a broad range of subject studied.
However, some subjects teach to the GCSE during year 9, particularity the core subjects.
I’m happy with this as it seems to get the balance right.

There is no research that it's better for kids. Ofsted are asking for a broad and balanced curriculum and are not keen on narrowing the curriculum early.
I'm a gov not a teacher, so they will know more.

Ofsted based their findings on research and that not having a generalised broad education, disadvantaged kids.

Starting GCSE content in Maths is normal. You've been doing GCSE since reception.

I don't know enough about English and Science but I would assume the skills you use are taught from at least Y7. I know our Science department do start "gcse content" in year 9 but I get the impression this would be covered in ks3 anyway.

Ofsted are more fussed about limiting pupils to a narrow curriculum too early. They aren't so fussed about the content being covered as long as you can justify why.

Our school just got an RI because we do three years gcse

I’m surprised that is the reason stated if all else is well.

How strange. DD’s school switched to 3 year GCES. Then got inspected and Ofsted praised them on their changes and how the SLT were doing great. They moved them from RI to good too. Not a mention in the report of 3 year GCSE not being good.

When were they inspected?

Re-reading the email the school are saying the pupils have been taught at a quicker pace so far and once in yr9 will continue to have some time in creative arts, ICT and MFL.

As they are only taught one MFL from yr7 (half of the year French, half spanish) and it's not compulsory for them to do at GCSE, a lot of the kids will spend the next 3 years without any/much exposure to another language. That can't be right surely?

In terms of English teaching , the three year GCSE has definitely had negative impacts. In practice, the whole thing has become constant teaching of 'skills' from about year 7 : this entails lots of reading of extracts (not many whole texts) followed by lots of comprehension style activities and extract analysis and lots of assessments under timed conditions. This is valuable, but it has become dominant in so many ways, that much of the creative responses to reading and writing have been squeezed out. The result is that many students find English repetitive, uninspiring and stressful. There is also the issue of lack of depth and breadth of exposure to texts with a 3 year GCSE where students might study the same Shakespeare, in effect, twice, for example.

Piggwaspushed - that's just bad teaching. There is absolutely no obligation to do nothing but exam texts and techniques in KS4, although that appears to be what happens with the 2-year GCSE course!